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[Pakhawaj]

I'd quite like a more in-depth SimEarth, a game where you can just sit back and watch things develop or watch how your interference in things plays out.
There would be a speed guage somewhere on screen, so one could progress (or regress) the time from up to billions of years per second down to single years per second. If one were to reverse the time, the future timeline would be erased leaving you at the point at which you stopped the reversal.
The game would begin at the creation of the planet from other large space rocks and it would end at the unlikely event of the total destruction of the planet either through sentient beings living on the planet or an external source.
Opportunities to change the atmosphere would be vast and unlimited and if any lifeforms appear, they'd evolve or die out according to the hardships in which they face. There would be no "Earth" species available for placing à la the original game because each species would be entirely procedurally generated according to the environment. There could be a tab to view the current life on the planet separated into simple groups such as "plant", "animal", "bacteria" etc. then split into further groups such as "algae", "fish", "positive cocci" etc., one could then click on one of the procedurally generated named for one of these living creatures (and rename it if so wished) and view a description of it with its length depending on how complex the organism is, so an "animal" would almost inevitably have more lines of text than a "bacteria".
In the event of intelligent life appearing, one could now click on a "sociological" tab, which (depending on how advanced this life is) would show the linguistic and cultural histories of the intelligent life perhaps an interfering player might be able to introduce new ideas to members of the populice with broad names such as "violence" or "egalitarianism", these could have broad affects depending upon the climate in which these ideas are introduced and the type of species they are introduced to. So for example, an intelligent species with scarce resources when introduced to violence might interpret that idea as being one of internal violence rather than external (each species would do their best to survive in any given situation and according to what they are able to do) in order to retain what little they had, perhaps they would become quite nihilistic, though I don't know how such a thing could be visually recorded.
I don't know if the player should have the ability to alter the shape of the planet manually or whether it should entirely be done through the introduction or addition of elements and chemicals and things.
Hopefully, this game would be just as interesting to a botanist as it would be to a geologist, physicist, sociologist, economist, chemist, zoologist... 

I can't think this game will ever exist, but it is a nice thought.
Sorry for rambling a little!

[Starver]

There could be a tab to view the current life on the planet separated into simple groups such as "plant", "animal", "bacteria" etc. then split into further groups such as "algae", "fish", "positive cocci" etc.,[...]

The thing that's largely stopped my previous attempts to codify such a system is that...  well... if you're willing to go so far as to eschew all classic terran species, and certainly encompass a completely non-anthropomorphic attitude to the term "higher life-forms", then you're not even guaranteed to be able to use quite the same descriptions of the word "fish" unless you're talking about "bony[1], water-inhabiting creatures" in the most generic term.

You can probably analogue the difference between single- and multi-cellular creatures, probably hash something out that differentiates plants from animals.  Although note the all-too-Real-World example of fungi being neither and lichen technically being symbiotically a combination of fungus and bacteria.  But who knows what a (potentially all-encompassing) simulation would come up with in regards to organisms not plainly classifiable as animal, plant, fungus ore bacterium.  Ignoring symbiosis and whatever parasitic combinations may create significantly abundant "sum greater than the parts" creations to warrant independant classification.

But I waffle.  All I'm trying to say is that if you're going to improve on SimEarth (which held me for a while, back when I last played with it, but had a number of intellectual failings, on top of interface issues, part of which you've mentioned and I agree with) you'll find someone even more pedantic.  And that's probably one of the reasons why I've messed around with any number of sim-like programs and never gotten around to completing any to any degree that I thought would be acceptable for an audience.  (Albeit that some never even escaped the confines of my cranium, however detailed they were conceptualised during whatever idle moments I applied to the problem.)


[1] Even that's a debatable word, especially if you want to include cartilaginous 'fish' in there as well, but let's say that this description encompasses any sort of creature with a distinct endoskeletal scaffolding, whatever its ultimate chemical nature and layout and tell the remaining pedants to "go bony-aquatic-creature harvest".

[Pakhawaj]

Haha, that's funny. I completely agree. I thought about this, but even within my unfeasible fantasies it seems, I make concessions to feasability.
It becomes difficult to categorise things that may exist out of a gargantuan number of possibilities. Since we have no good evidence of life living on other planets, unfortunately the only life we can compare things to is the life which sprang from our own planet. I think, once the moon turns purple and this game gets released the creators will probably have to use simple categories such as "plant" even if that limits what is possible within game to something similar to what occurred on Earth, otherwise we'd be either have to make up new terms for these new creatures (that's a blarg, member of blump family), or have terribly long and convoluted terms like "boneless, methane-breathing, stationary thing family". It's still a better categorisation system than in SimEarth though!

[Niveras]

Dungeon Keeper underground fortress building + overland conquering with an Overlord control scheme. I've actually given it a lot of thought but I don't want to bore you with the details.

Spoiler: Unless you want to be bored. (click to show/hide)

You target a territory, form your 'locus' (dungeon heart equivalent) underground, begin carving out a dungeon. Maybe a single plane for simplicity, maybe a could z-levels for depth. Raid the surface for resources, build up an army of creatures. Depending on your level of "visibility" and the difficulty/state of progression in the game, the surface may send adventurers, heroes, and even organized military squads to attack your dungeon, against which you must defend. Eventually your presence is sufficiently crystalized (via collecting souls - from raids - or mana - from 'mining') to lead your army to the surface yourself.

The goal on the surface is to either: subjugate, dominate, or annihilate the surface-dwellers. This is basically just a sliding scale depending on your level of devastation. Fully devastated, the territory remains occupied by a skeleton crew of your minions, because there's nothing of value left to gather. Dominating the population, they serve you - under minion overlords - and regularly return resources back to your primary lair. Subjugating, they're left largely to their own devices and you are only a terror to frighten children - until such time as you come to collect your tax in souls and resources. The overland game is basically Overlord - over the shoulder, commanding a variety of minions (with the option to engage in combat yourself) - but less puzzle solving and more rampant destruction. As you progress deeper into a given empire, the quality of defenses increases. Minion variety is closer to DK than it is Overlord, but they all fall into classes. A goblin warrior and a ghoul shadowknight are both assault troops, for example, whereas a goblin shaman and specter are support troops. Your overland conquering is assisted by forming squads prior to the assault, either of a single class or a mix, which you send along to objectives (such as engage another squad or capture a defined strategic location).

Resources sent back to your primary lair are used to progress your overall level of technology. Your primary lair is a bit of sandbox fort construction. How you expand and assign your minions - number of minions being limited by number of owned territories - defines how you go about conquering territories. Focusing on "research" for unlocks new equipment, spells, abilities; on "harvesting" improves the power and efficiency of your mana use; "forging" improves the quality of your minions' gear.

I've also defined three possible "demon" types (read: classes of overlord) to choose from. Their effects are varied and sometimes subtle, I'm not sure how effective it would be actually have classes in this sort of game. In any case:

There's the 'implacable dreadnought', very much akin to the Overlord of... Overlord. In heavy plate wielding a big weapon making sweeping attacks. Feeds on mana, becoming stronger and more resistant to damage with greater mana pools. Magic tends towards earth-destruction types, 'the dreadnought respects force and the earth responds in kind.' Your interim surface raiders tend to kill more enemies and bring back more loot (allowing you to 'tech up' in new territories faster), and also tend to fair better in direct combat. Favors dominating the population - obedience through terror.

There's the 'sinister shade.' Favors subtlety and coercion. In combat, blinks around quickly with cutting and stabbing attacks. Magic tends toward confusion and distraction, making your army more effective - and your army is better at attacking things whose attention is focused on something else (like another enemy). Its presence in a territory subtly affects the minds of surfacers, not merely dominating them through force but making honestly believe your way is the better way. Converts will show up at your doorstep on their own with their own valuables. They may also insinuate themselves amongst invaders to your dungeon, making it easier to deal with those parties of heroes. Favors leaving the people to themselves, so long as they choose to follow your will of their own accord.

The 'eldritch lich.' Favors not merely obliterating the enemy with spells, but corrupting them and nature itself into a twisted shadow. You don't send up raiding parties; instead your presence in the territory sickens and weakens the surface, slowly draining the life force and allowing the same void energies from which you are formed to permeate the surface and cause it to mutate, furthering death. This allows your ability to assault the surface to be merely a function of time (rather than success at raiding for souls as with the other two). Your army is less effective in combat but you have a range of powers to draw form that lay waste to broad areas of the battlefield. The lich is not strictly evil, but it is antithetical to the natural order of the world. Favors the scorched earth policy, though the wake of its destruction is not so much dead as it is chaotic and alien.

[Draco18s]

Dungeon Keeper underground fortress building + overland conquering with an Overlord control scheme. I've actually given it a lot of thought but I don't want to bore you with the details.

So, like Dungeons, but not shitty.

[drkpaladin]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who liked the ROTK games, I always felt a little silly looking forward to the relatively minor changes in between the games.  If I hadn't lost my copies of 9 and 13, I would have a reason to keep my ps2 plugged in.  I'm not even a otaku about the Three Kingdoms, I just enjoyed the styles of the games.

[Jay]

Re: Games you wish existed
Dwarf Fortress 1.0

:V

[Draco18s]

You're not the only one:

Dwarf Fortress 1.00?

[Mephansteras]

You're not the only one:

Dwarf Fortress 1.00?

At this one has a decent chance of getting completed. Maybe not for another few decades, but...

[Roboboy33]

-snip-

This

[TheBronzePickle]

Sounds like what Spore should have been. Hell, the game would be fun even if the entire premise was making a non-sentient animal population that survived the best without worrying about a civilization or space.

[Fniff]

I'd personally love a complete disaster simulation.

You get to choose what place you wanna use as a disaster zone, then go mad. Vampires and werewolves attack the city in eternal night? You got it. Wanna make Uzumaki in a city? Go ahead. Want a volcano to go off in the center of a city? Easy as pie. Wanna have all three occur at the exact same time? That's okay too! There would be hundreds of disasters, ranging from the realistic (Hurricane, epidemic, nuclear attack, riots) to the strange and unrealistic (Black hole, random sudden volcano for no reason, zombie outbreak (Romero or Left 4 Dead style), mutation)  to the downright absurd (Vampire, Werewolf and/or Demon attack, 100 foot monster, intrusion from another reality, spiral infection, the horsemen of the apocalypse), all in a fully living city filled with people who go to work, sleep and have fun. It'd be perfect just watching a town or a city go about it's daily business when you are about to drop a horrific mind-bending creature in the center. The best part would be combining disasters.

[TheBronzePickle]

There are games where you can sort of do that (screwing around on SimCity, where you can usually start disaters for the heck of it, comes to mind) but something modelling individual peoples' reactions to the chaos around them would be interesting. I could imagine braver citizens working alongside emergency services while the majority of people just run away. Maybe suicidal or psychotic people would welcome the chaos with open arms. The question is if it would be worth it to add physics. A nuke over a detailed city would be nightmarishly intensive on processing, as would having city-sized populations fighting the national guard MPs sent to suppress the city-wide riots.

[Fniff]

Snip

Sim City can only go so far. I have caused damn near apocalyptic situations yet the sims don't react. Even the sim I put in just complains about it, like everything else bad.

Anyway, those problems could be solved by having the play area be smaller, but not so much it ruins your fun completely. As with the nuke, you could make it play a cutscene then show the devastated city with the unaffected civilians put into a full-on panic mode.

[TheBronzePickle]

The main issue with a nuke is the amount of physics objects moving and interacting. If the physics objects were limited to large, simple pieces, it would minimize lag.